Celtics hold serve at home to pull within a win of reaching finals

Jim Fenton

Thursday

May 29, 2008 at 12:01 AMMay 29, 2008 at 4:32 AM

History is now on the side of the Boston Celtics in their quest to reach the NBA Finals for the first time since 1987. The Celtics have never lost a best-of-seven series after opening a 3-2 lead, going 29-for-29 in such situations, a streak that began in 1957.

History is now on the side of the Boston Celtics in their quest to reach the NBA Finals for the first time since 1987. The Celtics have never lost a best-of-seven series after opening a 3-2 lead, going 29-for-29 in such situations, a streak that began in 1957.

If history holds true, then the Celtics — now holding a 3-2 lead in the Eastern Conference finals — will close out the Detroit Pistons this weekend when they get two chances.

Given the way this series is playing out, however, the Celtics are going to need a lot more than just history to shed the Pistons and get back to the championship round beginning next Thursday.

The teams with the top two records during the regular season appear to be on course to battle it out to the bitter end in a series that just keeps going back and forth.

The slugfest continued for more than three intense hours Wednesday night when the Celtics held on for dear life and escaped with a 106-102 victory in a pivotal Game 5 at the TD Banknorth Garden.

They allowed a 15-point fourth-quarter lead get whittled down to one point by the Pistons before putting a stop to the comeback bid in the closing seconds.

Now, it’s back to Auburn Hills, Mich., where the Celtics have a chance to eliminate the Pistons, and if that doesn’t happen, there’ll be a third Game 7 taking place here Sunday night with perhaps the Los Angeles Lakers waiting for the winner.

“This was a huge game,” said Paul Pierce. “I mean, we don’t get this game, we put ourselves in a position to have to win another road game. We know how tough it is to win out there in Detroit.

“It was a crucial game at home, get the lead just to get some momentum, get the momentum back. We said that coming into this game, this is like a Game 7 and we responded. We knew it wasn’t going to be easy.”

The Celtics are headed back to Michigan with the series lead after Coach Doc Rivers rode his five starters for nearly the entire second half, and they fought off fatigue to squeak out the win.

All five of the starters played at least 38:40, and they appeared to be wobbly down the stretch when the Pistons were making their bid to turn the series in their favor.

Kevin Garnett (33 points, seven rebounds), Ray Allen (29 points on 9 of 15 shooting to snap out of his slump), Kendrick Perkins (sensational with 18 points and 16 rebounds), Pierce (16 points, six assists) and Rajon Rondo (13 assists, six rebounds, four steals in nearly 46 minutes) did their parts to move the Celtics closer to the NBA Finals.

“Everybody brought their ‘A’ game tonight and that’s the reason we won,” said Pierce. “We don’t get the efforts from a number of people, we don’t walk out of here with a win tonight.”

If the Celtics didn’t walk out of the building with a victory, their chances of moving on in the playoffs would not have been spectacular, not with the prospects of having a must-win situation on the road.

“You don’t win this game, you basically put yourself in a corner,” said Garnett. “I thought we had good focus, good energy to begin with. You know they’re going to make a run. You know they’re experienced and they’ve been in a lot of pressure situations.

“Now it’s up to us to go up there and try to get one.”

Game 5 was a microcosm of the series with both teams taking turns of being in charge, though the Celtics used a magnificent third quarter to gain control. That was when Allen got his shot to drop, hitting for 16 points when the lead grew as high as 17.

As superb as the Celtics played during that stretch, they were tentative and sluggish in the fourth quarter when everything nearly fell apart on them.

“Man, it was the longest fourth quarter out of all the games we’ve played in,” said Pierce. “I was a little disappointed the way we played the fourth quarter.

“I thought throughout the game we played well, but the fourth quarter is something we’re going to have to go back and look at because if we get ourselves in this position again in Detroit, we’ve got to be able to close the game out a little bit better than we did tonight.

“We’ve got to continue to be aggressive. I thought it was a little passive when they put out the traps, but you’ve got to understand, hey, that’s the playoffs and it’s not going to be easy.”

Very little has come easy in a series that has lived up to its billing with neither team able to put back-to-back wins together.

With time running out, though, the Celtics have put themselves in a 3-2 spot that has been automatic for them 29 times before.

Staff writer Jim Fenton can be reached at Jfenton@enterprisenews.com.

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